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the exercise of personal taste and discrimination in securing an article not only of greater artistic merit, but of greater durability. THE LOOM AND ITS WORK The hand loom is Oriental, the power loom Occidental. The former adds much to the fame of the Orient. The exquisite fabrics it produces have made it world-renowned, and although it is simple in structure, its products show careful and finished labor. Hand looms in all Oriental countries are similar, and are to-day almost as imperfectly developed as when used by the ancient Egyptians. To weave their mats, the ancient Egyptians took the coarse fibre of the papyrus and, with the help of pegs, stretched it between two poles which were fastened in the ground. Two bars were placed in between these poles, the threads of the warp serving to keep them apart. The woof thread was passed through and pressed down tightly a number of times with a bent piece of wood. The loom now generally used in the Orient is made by fastening two poles perpendicularly in the ground to a sufficient depth, leaving above ground as much of each pole as equals in length the desired rug. This framework supports two horizontal rollers, the warp threads being wound around the upper, while the ends are fastened to the lower; at this the weaving is begun, and on it the rug is rolled while in process of construction. To the warp threads of fine linen or cotton the weavers tie the tufts of worsted that form the pile. This worsted, which has been dyed previously, hangs over their heads in balls. When a row of knots is finished, it is pressed down to the underlying woof by a long and heavy comb with metal teeth. Then the tufts are clipped close with shears, to make the pile. In the finer rugs there are seldom more than two, or at the most three, threads between every two rows of knots, but in the coarser kinds there are more threads. In many districts every family possesses a loom, and it is generally small enough to be carried from place to place. Sir George C. Birdwood has seen the web in the horizontal loom in Western India kept stretched by being wrapped, as worked, round the body of the weaver. In some instances the spinners make thread from the cotton wool by using the left hand as a distaff, and the right one as a spindle. In other cotton rugs which he has seen, the warp threads were placed horizontally, and the loom was without treadles and reed. The woof threads were thrown across by the
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